by Derek Hansen
The shaft descended about ten metres to the level where the Finch claystone bisected the sandstone. While the shaft was no deeper than the others around it, the horizontal tunnels were wider and higher. There were three of them, running off at different angles, where Rodney’s dad had searched for the lens which he hoped would deliver precious opal. There were marks on the tunnel roofs and walls where Rodney’s father had barred down the scale, and little dead-end pockets where he’d gouged out dirt on a whim or under the direction of a dream. The system was a monument to lost labour and the miners’ most constant companions, optimism and disappointment. But to Billy it was Aladdin’s Cave, at least potentially.
He followed Neil’s instructions and let Rodney lead, dragging a bucket and spade along behind him while his mate carried the picks. They ignored the higher tunnels and entered the lowest, which was the last one Rodney’s dad had worked. Even though the ceiling was so high they could almost stand up, they crawled through on their hands and knees until they came to a gallery. At some stage Rodney’s dad had obviously thought he was on the right track, because he’d used roof bolts to support the roof and braced it with two props while he scoured out around.
Billy’s eyes opened wide. He’d never been in a tunnel that opened into a gallery before, which made it special and the perfect place to begin gouging. He stared at the walls looking for inspiration, any small variation or difference in the claystone that indicated a divergence in the seam. Different eyes see different things, but Billy’s eyes saw nothing that was any different to anywhere else. Undeterred, he began to chip away at the wall nearest to him with the extra pick Rodney had carried. In no time at all he’d filled the bucket with soil, and that didn’t take into account any of the claystone Rodney had chipped away.
‘We’re gunna have to take turns,’ said Billy. ‘One of us digs while the other fills the bucket and takes it back to the shaft.’
Rodney just nodded and kept scratching away with his pick. His small build wasn’t much good for rugby league but it was perfect for working in tight places. He loved working down mines. It was something he was good at and, besides, opals were in his blood.
Billy dragged the bucket to the shaft and tied the rope they’d shimmied down to the handle. He stood back from the shaft as Neil hauled the heavy bucket up to the surface, taking cover to avoid getting pelted by any debris the bucket might dislodge. When he crawled back to the gallery Rodney had another load ready for him. He filled the bucket again and dragged it back to the shaft. On his eighth trip he began to run out of steam and enthusiasm. Rodney showed no sign of letting up or taking over the bucket.
‘It’s my turn to dig,’ said Billy. ‘Your turn to pull the bucket.’
‘Nod yed,’ said Rodney. ‘One more, jud one more.’
‘That’s what you said last time.’
‘Jud one more.’
‘Okay, just one.’ Billy dragged the heavy bucket back to the shaft and called up to Neil. ‘Rodney won’t give me a turn digging. He always wants me to take one more bucketload.’
‘Tell him he’s gotta give you a go,’ said Neil. ‘Tell him I said so.’
He gathered the slack out of the rope and began lifting. Rodney’s dad had built a good collar around the top of the shaft so he had something to brace his feet against, but even so the effort of hauling up the bucket had already made the muscles in his arms burn. They needed a windlass, but Rodney’s dad only had a couple and they were always in use. To ease the burden he let the rope run against the side of the collar. He knew that would tip the bucket and gouge the shaft wall and also cause some of the claystone to tumble out, but he was just too hot and tired to do it any other way. He felt the bucket dig in against an irregularity in the wall and gave it a heave. Almost immediately he heard Billy cry out in pain.
‘You all right?’ he called.
‘Yeah,’ said Billy, but the tone of his voice made it clear that he was close to tears.
‘What happened?’
‘Something fell and hit me.’
‘Where?’
‘On my head.’
‘It’s your own fault for standing in the shaft. Get back in the tunnel while I pull the bucket the rest of the way up.’
‘I’ve got a lump. It’s really big.’
‘Is it bleeding?’
‘No.’
‘Then you’re all right. Try to find the rock that hit you and we’ll smash it up to get even. But wait till I get the bucket all the way up.’ Neil hauled the bucket up to the top and emptied it. Nine bucketloads didn’t look much for all the effort they’d put in. ‘Okay, Billy,’ he called. ‘Find the culprit before I drop the bucket back down.’
‘Found it.’ Billy put the stone in his pocket.
‘Great, now stand back.’
Rodney did six trips with the full bucket but his small body wasn’t up to doing any more. Billy, who’d just got into the rhythm of chipping away at the claystone, didn’t feel at all disposed to swapping back to their original jobs. He was certain opal was just another chip of the pick away and he wanted to be the one who found it. But Rodney was worn out, so was Neil, and so were the batteries in their torches. They decided to call it a day and run their pile of opal dirt through the rumbler. They found no more than Rodney’s dad had. They couldn’t believe that all the effort had come to nothing.
‘Give me a hand,’ said Neil. ‘We’ve got to bury all this stuff under shin-cracker.’
‘Do we have to?’ said Billy. His disappointment hung over him like a cloud. He knew they wouldn’t come back looking for opals and he had to face the fact that he had no hope of solving his family’s financial problems and even less of becoming their hero. It was a bitter pill.
They broke up enough shin-cracker to hide the evidence of their illicit endeavours and headed back to Rodney’s shack to get a drink of water and lie down somewhere in the shade. Rodney was no less disappointed than Billy.
‘Give me a look at the bump on your head,’ said Neil. ‘If Mum sees it, she’ll want to know how it happened.’
‘It’s going down,’ said Billy. He sat up. ‘Can you feel it?’
‘Jeepers,’ said Neil, as he ran his fingers over the bump. ‘Have a feel, Rodney. You could break your neck falling off something like that.’
The boys started laughing and suddenly the day didn’t seem quite so disappointing.
‘Did you ged the rock that hid you?’ said Rodney.
‘Yeah,’ said Billy. He reached into his pocket. ‘Look at the size of it.’
He handed it over to Rodney, who saw instantly what the rock really was. There was a glaze where the bucket had scraped it. They’d already put their picks and pincers back in the toolshed so Rodney spat on the opposite side and rubbed it vigorously with his hand. It glowed.
‘Id an o-pal,’ said Rodney. ‘Id a big black like the one that they ged up on the Ridge.’
It wasn’t just what he said but the awe and wonder in his voice as he said it. Rodney had clearly never seen an opal like it.
‘Yes!’ screamed Billy. ‘Yes!’ He threw his arms into the air triumphantly. ‘I knew we’d do it.’
‘Good on you,’ said Neil, but it was doubtful Billy even heard him. He was dancing with joy and relief, the bush ringing with his magical laugh.
‘Did id real-ly my dad,’ said Rodney. He was almost in tears over the magnitude of the sin he’d committed. ‘My dad nev-ver god one thid good.’
‘That’s not the deal,’ said Neil.
‘My dad will kill me if he find oud. Id far too big to come from mul-lock. He gunna kill me.’
‘Then we won’t tell him,’ said Neil. ‘My dad can sell it secretly to someone up on the Ridge.’
‘Id not fair.’ Tears fell from Rodney’s eyes and splashed onto the opal.
Neil didn’t know what to say. Rodney was right. It wasn’t fair. But one of the boys had to come second: either his dancing ecstatic brother or the despondent Rodney. He thought of the effort they�
�d put in, all in good faith, and the deal they’d made. Okay, they shouldn’t have gone underground and, by rights, they should show it to Rodney’s dad. But if they did that, Rodney’s dad would either beat the daylights out of Rodney or keep the opal. Neil realised that fairness was all a matter of where you stood. Rodney’s dad had dug out the mine and Neil now had a good appreciation of the hard work involved. But Billy had found the opal fair and square. In his eyes, that meant Billy was entitled to keep it. He reached over to take the opal out of Rodney’s hand. Rodney clung onto it, tears streaming down his face.
‘It’s Billy’s.’
‘No id nod! Id my dad!’
‘I’m sorry, Rodney, I really am. I wish you’d found it, but you didn’t. Billy did.’
Rodney let go of the opal and that made him cry worse. His small body was racked with sobs. Neil turned away, unable to witness his friend’s grief.
‘Billy, come here.’
Billy stopped dancing and looked at his brother suspiciously. There was something in the tone of his voice that put him on guard.
‘What?’
‘Come here.’
‘What’s wrong with Rodney?’
‘What do you think?’
‘Yeah, but I found it, Neil, I found it.’ Billy stared at Rodney defiantly. ‘I found it, Rodney.’
‘Look at the size of it, Billy. We’re not supposed to find opals that big. It’s bigger than anything Rodney’s dad has found.’
‘It’s my opal!’
‘Is it?’ said Neil.
‘Yes!’
‘Can you imagine what will happen to Rodney if his dad finds out? Can you imagine what he’ll do to him?’
Rodney’s sobbing doubled at the thought.
‘The truth is, Billy, we weren’t entitled to even look for opals underground. Up at the Ridge you can get lynched just for looking in someone else’s mine and you know it.’
‘Oh, please don’t make me give it to him, please.’ Billy was distraught. ‘Please!’
‘I’m not going to make you do anything, Billy. You just have to do what you think is right.’
Billy howled in anguish and buried his face in his hands.
‘It’s not fair!’
Neil had rarely seen his brother so upset but made no move to comfort him. In his mind the tide of the argument had changed and he knew with absolute certainty what was right.
‘Do I have to?’ pleaded Billy.
‘Look at Rodney and you tell me.’
Rodney looked pitiful. His face was lined with streaks of dirt turned to mud by tears, and snot streamed from his nostrils. He looked pleadingly at Billy, too choked up to speak.
Billy grabbed the stone out of his brother’s hand, stared at it as hard as he’d ever stared at anything, as though burning its image into his memory. Without saying a word he stuck it in Rodney’s hand, turned and ran off into the scrub.
Rodney’s hands clasped tight around the stone in case Billy changed his mind. Whatever else happened, he was determined not to let go until he’d delivered it safely to his father. He looked up at Neil, at first wary then filled with a flood of relief when Neil stood and offered him a hand up.
‘Let’s get Billy and go find your dad. What do you say?’
They found Rodney’s dad sitting by a pile of mullock at his newest site, washing the disappointment of the day away with a mug of tea he’d brewed up in his billy. His weary body shook with the tremors that Rodney would one day inherit. Dust and grit covered his clothes and skin and his tired eyes regarded the boys suspiciously.
‘Dad!’ said Rodney. ‘Ged whad? We found an opal. A big black.’
Whether it was the words Rodney said or the tone in his voice, his father shot to his feet as though struck by a cattle prod.
‘Led me dee id!’
‘Look!’
Rodney’s dad snatched the opal from his son’s hand and examined it closely. His hands began shaking violently but that had less to do with his tremors than with excitement.
‘Where’d ya ged id?’
‘Ad the trip-ple. The one you al-wade daid wad good.’
‘Da trip-ple? Knew id! All wade knew id!’ At that moment, Rodney’s dad didn’t give a hoot that the boys had disobeyed his instructions and gone underground. He was too wrapped up in the opal and the vindication of his beliefs. But something triggered an alarm bell inside his head. Maybe it was all the disappointments he’d had to live with and his conviction that nothing ever came easy or without a catch.
‘Who found id?’ he demanded.
Rodney seemed to shrink in size. His father looked angrily from Billy to Neil.
‘Who found id!’
‘Billy found it, Mr Webb,’ said Neil. ‘But we all agreed it really belongs to you.’
‘You bed id be-long to me.’ He glared at them. ‘You bed id dud. Come wid me.’
The boys followed along behind Rodney’s dad, feeling guilty and ashamed but still excited.
‘Do you think it’ll be another butterfly, Mr Webb?’ asked Billy cautiously.
‘I dun-no.’
‘Mide ev-en be a har-de-quin,’ said Rodney.
‘I reckon it’ll polish up with a heap of red in it,’ said Neil. ‘I reckon I could see red in it.’
‘There’d red in id,’ said Rodney’s dad.
The sun was just dropping behind the sand ridges when they reached the shed where Rodney’s dad polished his opals. Usually Neil and Billy had left for home by this time, so they could get back before it was completely dark. But neither boy gave a thought to leaving. They had to know what it was that they’d found. Typically, Billy was excited by everyone else’s excitement and not brooding over his sacrifice. When Rodney’s dad started the diamond-studded wheel, they crowded around to watch.
Rodney’s dad had fashioned braces which he could rest his hands against to stop them shaking while he worked. Even more than the boys, he wanted to know exactly what it was they’d found, yet he worked with painstaking slowness, continually stopping his polishing to examine his progress.
‘Whad do you think?’ asked Rodney.
‘Dun-no yed,’ said his dad.
Rodney’s dad slowly worked across the top of the opal and then gently around the top half of the sides. Even his audience could see colour refracting when he stopped to examine it. He turned the opal to the light and slowly revolved it.
‘Thad’ll do for to-night,’ he said. ‘I know whad id id.’
‘What?’ asked Billy. The tension was unbearable.
Rodney’s dad smiled, a sight so rare the boys almost didn’t realise what it was.
‘Id will polid up in-to a nide har-de-quin. Pud mon-ey on id.’
‘A harlequin!’ said Billy. ‘Oh boy, I found a harlequin!’
Rodney’s dad stopped smiling and his face darkened ominously. The juddering of his jaw and the constant play of the muscles in his face made it hard for the boys to guess what he was thinking but they were suddenly wary. Rodney’s dad pointed an accusing finger at Billy.
‘You come wid me.’ He turned to Rodney and Neil. ‘You two day he-yah.’
Billy’s eyes filled with fear and apprehension. He remembered what Neil had said about how trespassing in other people’s mines was a lynching offence up at the Ridge. He recalled the bruises he’d seen on Rodney’s arms and legs after his dad had dished out a hiding and turned pleadingly to Neil. His brother looked as scared as he felt but made no move towards him.
‘Come!’ commanded Rodney’s dad. He took Billy’s arm and dragged him out of the shed.
‘What’s he going to do to him?’ whispered Neil.
‘I dun-no,’ said Rodney fearfully.
Rodney’s dad took Billy into his shack and sat him down at the kitchen table.
‘You day he-yah.’
Billy stayed. He waited wide-eyed as Rodney’s dad disappeared into his bedroom, expecting him to return with a leather strop or wooden spoon, whatever it was he used to punish Rodney. Inst
ead Rodney’s dad emerged clutching a Smith Kendon sweets tin. Billy almost fainted with relief.
‘I god dom-thin for you.’
Billy watched as Rodney’s dad began unscrewing the lid, certain now that he was going to be rewarded rather than beaten. A boiled sweet didn’t seem much for finding the opal, but it was a far better alternative to the hiding he’d expected. Billy’s jaw dropped. There were no sweets in the tin. Instead, Rodney’s dad pulled out pieces of cotton wool, opened them and lay them on the table. Billy’s eyes nearly burst out of his skull.
‘You chood.’
Billy stared at the opals. There were five in all, none of them as big or in remotely the same class as the one he’d found, but all of them were beautifully shaped and polished, and similar in size and colour. The dominant colours were green and red although some had a pale, slightly milky field.
‘Go on, chood.’
‘Choose?’
Billy hesitated, barely able to grasp the opportunity he was being given. He’d have been delighted to find any one of the opals out on the mullock. There was one in the shape of an elongated oval that took his fancy. His hands shook as he reached for it.
‘Thad a good one,’ said Rodney’s dad. ‘But thid one id word more.’ He picked up a more regularly shaped opal and passed it to Billy. The field was emerald green, and it burned with reds, oranges and traces of blue. ‘If you wan id, id yourd.’
Billy took the opal and rotated it in the light so that it refracted different colours at him.
‘It’s a real good one, Mr Webb. You done a real good job on it.’
‘Id yourd.’
Billy’s eyes were watering when he turned to Rodney’s dad.
‘Do you really mean it? I can keep it?’
‘Yed. Take id.’
‘Yes!’ screamed Billy. His plans were back on track. He’d found an opal. He’d solved the family’s problems and he’d be a hero. Life just didn’t get any better. ‘Thanks, Mr Webb! Thanks a million!’ He got up off his chair and raced out of the door towards the work shed to show Neil and Rodney, shrieking with delight.